“Do you think this changes anything?”
“I think it does but before we start I’ll give you the option to surrender. You’ll just have to relinquish the system to me, I will of course guarantee your safety.”
“Are you serious? Give away my system? Over my dead body!”
While the two leaders exchanged some quick words while the two sides clashed with each other. The appearance of Zhang Dong’s army was quite unexpected. This left the whole demonic city in a state of chaos. The beasts that were used to power the outer formation were loose and attacking the nascent soul masters while the orthodox cultivators were coming from the outside.
Large ships made of spirit iron continued to appear along with more traditional cultivators of beasts and flying swords. This was clearly a planned endeavor but why this attack was taking place wasn’t too obvious to these people.
Orthodox and demonic cultivators most of the time stayed out of their regions. While the former side was considered to be stronger they didn’t really have anything to gain from clashing with the demonic cultivators. The lands here were devoid of spiritual energy that regular cultivators could use and the treasures wouldn’t give them an edge either.
“I thought you would say that, you give me no choice then, one way or another this will end here.”
“Haha, do you think those NPC forces will be enough?”
Wang Long didn’t seem impressed by the flying ships and the army that was quickly appearing. Even the new golden dragon Bahamut that was equal to his soul beast didn’t shake his resolve. In his eyes Zhang Dong made one big mistake, he decided to bring the fight to his faction base where he had the advantage.
“Let me show you how it’s done!”
With a click on his system screen, he activated the buffing function. It was the same one Zhang Dong used when Wang Long invaded the United Element sect. Yet this time around the ones that were getting enhanced were the demonic cultivators from the Chaos Sect. The nascent soul masters could feel their energy circulating, it was as if they were young again and also possessed more power than they ever did.
“You think this is all? I’ve spent a lot of points on toys just to see you eat shit!”
It didn’t look like this was all as Wang Long continued grinning and activating functions on his system. Zhang Dong remained quiet but deep inside he was also smiling. His opponent was not aware that he was showing his cards too soon. First of all the buff wouldn’t last forever and he already activated it before measuring his opponent's full battle prowess.
Then second of all he was showing him another trump card in the form of the Demon King castle that was now slowly floating out of the volcano. This thing was quite similar to the golden castle he had procured from the Long Clan. He wasn’t sure if it was bought with the help of spirit points or if it was just a counter fortress to the one he had. It could have just been a backup for the situation of a system holder going for a demonic route.
The sight of this giant gaudy-looking dark lava castle sent shivers down the demonic cultivators. Everyone could feel that this was a treasure of unfathomable power and probably not something the orthodox sect that was attacking them could combat. Yet their hearts sunk soon after as they felt a spike in spiritual energy in the middle of the assaulting force armada.
In a blink, a huge structure on par with their Demon King’s castle appeared out of thin air. It was a magnificent golden castle with massive walls and huge cannons stuck to them. It was clear that the attackers came prepared to counter Wang Long’s own fortress of doom.
“How did you…”
“You’re not the only one with a castle here incel-boy.”
“Stop calling me that!”
“Make me!”
Zhang Dong peeked behind at his sect members. There he could see or feel his family members like Liena and Zhang Jin. Besides them, there were also his friends and faithful retainers like Huo Qiang and Zhang Zhi that were ready to risk their lives for this endeavor.
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In reality, there was no reason to involve them this soon or at all. Perhaps the better way would be to just hang out at the Long Clan and shield himself behind the Azure Emperor that had some kind of backup plan. That might have been the safer route but also one that would endanger the lives of more people inside of the empire. As long as Wang Long remained in power, even the other invaders seemed like a lesser problem.
Finally, it was time for the last rodeo but before the spiritual energy blasts started flying the side belonging to the demonic cultivators encountered another problem. Only the outer city had been breached and the enemy cannons were unable to pierce through the inner city barrier.
While that remained functional their forces could always retreat. The outer city wasn’t really their main base, everything that they needed to survive was where the sect was. They would be able to even survive years there without any support from the outside. With the exposed spirit vein they had an almost unlimited amount of energy to get back to.
Already the barrier was expanding and people were going to the cannons that they would use to shoot down the flying ships in the sky. Their plan was to use the one-way barrier in their favor. They could keep firing their weapons at the enemy while the forcefield would block the barrage from outside.
They were convinced that before they run out of spiritual energy the ships in the sky would be nothing more than rubble. Their enemies had made a stupid decision to come with such a paltry force. In their eyes, they wouldn't attempt a feat like this without at least twice as much firepower.
Yet before the first cannon could fire towards the closest ship or the large golden fortress, a tiny beam of golden light collided with the barrier. It came from the leader of their new enemies and didn’t cause any damage.
“Wait, what’s happening? Why is the grand array flickering?”
The tiny ray of light wasn’t there to cause damage, it was just a trigger for his backdoor entrance to open. The work he went through to sabotage the grand formation bore fruit quite soon as the coast was clear. The surprised demonic cultivators didn’t even have time to react as their cannons that should have been indestructible exploded from a long-range cannon blast.
“Their formations are down, everyone attack with all your might!”
While the whole place exploded into something that looked like a rainbow light show the two leaders continued to look at each other. Zhang Dong was trying to examine the capabilities of his opponent while also getting on top of his own dragon. Both of them were in possession of a system that brought in a certain randomness factor.
‘I should expect him to have a lot of items from that store but he can’t have that much after getting that floating castle…’
The previous encounter with this person wasn’t that tough as he took him by surprise. Not much time had passed and Wang Long probably wasn’t able to learn that many new tricks. His approach was to kill his old faction and use what he gained to artificially inflate his all-around power.
This was a double-edged sword that Zhang Dong expected Wang Long to have ignored. He already proved himself to be lazy and over-reliant on the system. His answer to the previous loss was just to get more spirit points and get better techniques and arts. What he didn’t count in were the proficiencies that could not be increased through the system.
A system user was given the knowledge of the skill or technique but they still needed to use it to get better at it. He expected Wang Long to have been a couch potato just like he was before. Without proper training and moving the body around it was impossible to perform a technique to its perfection even when the system implanted all of the knowledge.
‘His movements are unrefined for sure…’
They quickly clashed with each other. Sparks flew and his golden energy bounced away from the darkened demonic one of his opponents. None of them did any damage to each other but it looked like Wang Long at a base had more energy than even Zhang Dong.
‘The old system is really a giant cheat if you have no issue killing people…’
He was different from his replacement. Killing people never came easy and even now he was unconvinced of his current strategy. Yet his opponent didn’t really give him a choice, the longer he lived the stronger he became and the more people would die. To end all of this madness he needed to put an end to it.
Somewhere deep inside he did blame himself for Wang Long’s appearance. Perhaps all those years ago during the expedition, if he didn’t let his pride slip out then all of this would have never happened. But perhaps the immortal that created that place would have forced him to lose his previous system in another way that he wouldn’t be able to control.
Yet this was not the time to think back to his beginning as before him stood his greatest enemy, Wang Long. To Zhang Dong he was a skewed reflection of the person that he could have easily become if he let this world's morals cloud his own judgment. Instead, he chose to take the harder route of working things out with people if that option arose.
‘I should probably take this fight somewhere else…’
Wang Long clearly didn’t care for the citizens or his faction at all. If this happened inside Spirit Spring City, Zhang Dong would actually start losing points for damaging his own buildings and having the approval rating fall down. Here on the other hand the zombie dragon continued to give out deadly mists that corroded everything and made the building turn to dust.
Luckily after all the comments about Wang Long's insecurities and virgin status, he was truly mad. It didn’t take much for him to give chase as he propelled himself towards the more desolate area to the side. There his plan was to take him out just like the Demi-Human Emperor and end this farce once and for all.